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But can a child's empathy overwhelm them?
Parents and teachers often wonder how to address current events without increasing fears, but also ensure that children develop empathy and compassion and learn to recognize their own biases and prejudices.
Cultivating the capacity for empathy promotes greater acceptance and insight into the motives, experiences, and hardships of others. This includes broader issues, such as inequality, climate change, the upcoming US elections, and the wars in Ukraine and Gaza to name a few. On a level closer to home, though, empathy can help gifted children learn to control their frustration toward others who don't grasp information quickly or learn to accept their parent's or teacher's imperfections.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
How to cultivate empathy
Empathy is one of many tools necessary for achieving social justice and addressing the wrongs they encounter. Compassion experts like Tara Brach and Kristin Neff and Sharon Salzberg remind us to cultivate empathy and compassion for those we do not particularly like or understand, as well as for ourselves. Our job as parents or teachers is to help children develop empathy and awareness, quell their fears, and embolden them to go forth in the world with eyes wide open.
Gifted children grasp information quickly and are hungry to learn. Due to their sensitivity, they respond emotionally to highly charged situations. When they feel safe, understood, and permitted to express their fears and uncertainty without shame, they are more likely to remain open to others' suffering.
Through your guidance, support and attunement to their emotional needs — along with an educational environment that teaches about differences, injustice, and compassion for others — gifted children can flex their empathy muscles and enlist their drive for meaningful learning. Engaging their capacity for empathy through literature, hands-on experiences, and values clarification exercises can be transformative. In an article on Medium, I described how a reading assignment in middle school opened my mind to my own biases:
"When I was in middle school, we read “All Quiet on the Western Front,” the story of a German soldier’s horrific experiences during World War I. As a 12-year-old, steeped in movies about the Second World War, I viewed all German soldiers as “bad people.” This book challenged my prejudices, as I realized the protagonist was just another powerless adolescent, drafted into a pointless war and forced to experience the carnage and devastation no one should have to endure. This new awareness — this empathy for someone who previously embodied a negative stereotype — opened my eyes and challenged my naïve view of the world."
Managing overwhelming feelings
Your gifted child might seem to possess a bit too much empathy at times, though. They worry and become distraught and overwhelmed when they encounter inequities or see how others suffer.*
We can protect them from overwhelming fears by creating a safe environment where they can explore their questions and worries. Of course, their developmental level and ability to understand complex and nuanced problems must be considered. Otherwise, information that is too emotionally disturbing or too complex for them to grasp will overwhelm them.
Working with gifted children to put their fears into perspective, build resilience, and identify how they can actively work toward improving the lives of others can be invaluable. You can help them learn to manage their emotions with calming strategies, improved self-regulation skills, and using their capacity for logic to challenge unrealistic thinking. (More on this in future articles.)
Of course, physical and emotional safety is essential and we must work to ensure that our children are not targets of bias, prejudice, or at its worst, violence. Children who live and attend school in environments where violence is a common occurrence face relentless fear and trauma. Eliminating these threats requires a systemic effort on the part of the community.
What you can do
We do our children and students a disservice if we fail to prepare them for a widely diverse and sometimes, troubled and fractured world.
You can activate their inquisitive minds by pointing out situations that require an acceptance of differences, tolerance, and empathy, and an appreciation that they have the power to offer at least some help. As Gottlieb and colleagues pointed out, gifted children learn best when immersed in learning that engages their search for meaning and a sense of purpose. You might start with a few questions or creative suggestions:
1. What do you imagine that person is feeling right now? What are some of the emotions you would feel if you were going through it? How would you react if your best friend was going through this? Encourage them to engage in perspective-taking, where they empathize with what the other is experiencing.
2. What circumstances might have led to their predicament? Enlist brainstorming to encourage them to consider a range of possibilities, regardless of how far-fetched their ideas might seem. You can help them narrow down realistic assumptions later.
3. Even though that person or their culture seem so different, can you make a list of how they are similar to you? Help them appreciate their similarities to recognize that there is SO much we all have in common. Teachers can direct them to literature that increases their empathy for those who seem so different.
4. Can you design, draw, or build a solution? Encourage them to be productive and use their creative skills to envision how they might aid those in need. Some examples (depending on their age) might include using LEGOs to design a "hurricane-proof" home, coming up with a list of necessities for the homeless, launching a food drive at their school, or working on a mural project that conveys the diversity found in your community.
5. How do you want to help those in need when you grow up? What type of job might be fun, but also help others? Help them appreciate that they can enlist compassion and empathy in just about any job or activity. They don't need to be in a "helping" profession to treat others equitably and honestly. And even when your young adult child has little money, they can still donate their time through volunteer activities.
I was fortunate to have had a teacher who encouraged self-reflection and openness to others’ different backgrounds. All children deserve an education that awakens their intrinsic ability to feel compassion and empathy for others. And that education starts both at home and at school.
*If you or your child need support or their anxiety is persistent, counseling with a licensed mental health professional can help.
Photo courtesy of Pexels: Dipin Marharjan
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